The 5 People You Meet in Line at South by Southwest

The most universal experience of the festival is spending a lot of time standing next to strangers

Some come for the bite-size intellectual thrills of hearing experts wax rhapsodic about innovations that will #changetheworld for the better. Some come for the excuse to spend hours at a stretch hunkered down in theater seats, watching movies that might never otherwise get to local cinemas. Some come drawn by a band to which they’re already devoted and leave having discovered several incredible new acts to add to their Spotify playlists.

Man, you guys were not kidding about the lines. This year is my own first SXSW, and I’d reckon that at least half the time I’ve spent in the vicinity of the festival has been spent either traveling between venues or queuing up for the next big thing.

My wife, who has been lingering in Florida for several extra days following a family wedding, texted me a picture last night of the gorgeous sunset she was witnessing from the beach on Siesta Key. I responded to her with a photo of my own vantage point, about halfway up the block and around the corner from the Alamo Ritz, waiting 45 minutes to get into an 85-minute movie.

Aside from Lemon, and a nearly 40-minute wait the other night for a SXSW shuttle to show up at the South Lamar Alamo, every event I’ve attended at the festival so far has proven worth the cost of seeing precious minutes of my life tick away as I literally stand still. Lines are inevitable at huge happenings like this, after all, so there’s no use in getting all hot and bothered about them. Instead get to know your fellow travelers.

Here are the five most memorable recurring characters I’ve encountered in queues.

Film Industry Geek

Note the word “industry.” This isn’t a mere “film geek,” the sort who keeps a running spreadsheet of every film he’s ever seen, rating each on an 8-point scale of his own devising. That sort, the one who appreciates film as an art form, is easily understandable. The industry geek possesses that same propensity to beat you over the noggin with a pedantic lecture about film stock and aspect ratios, but he takes it a step farther with encyclopedic knowledge of which films (films, never “movies”) scored primo distribution deals at Sundance.

The Befuddled

Perhaps the SXSW attendee who delights me most, the Befuddled is an eccentric sort of late-middle-age woman who has retained enough of her youthful spirit of adventure to dare venture into the throngs who descend upon downtown Austin but — gee willikers — has she seem some crazy things, let her tell you. Her packed festival itinerary, which she will be happy to recount for you in detail, makes you feel like a lightweight. She’s seen and done so much, yet it remains unclear whether she understood any of it. She’s having a ball, regardless. God bless her.

Vaguely Foreign Girl

She travels alone, with a backpack. Her accent is British. Or, wait, maybe Swedish? She sits on the sidewalk to read from her Kindle during the wait. When she breaks out her lunch to have a bite, you’re unsurprised to see her take the lid off a metal camping bowl and expose a somehow-still-hot meal of noodles mixed with broccoli, asparagus, and...what is that? Cabbage?

The Ayn Rand Power Couple

They’re exquisitely dressed, catalog perfect. Whether the event calls for a preppy or grungy look, they came prepared. They’re both beautiful to behold, with severely intimidating features that would force you to insist that they step ahead of you in line, if you dared take more than a passing glance. They’re comparing notes about how far each of them has gotten in the Elon Musk biography they’re reading. Did you know he didn’t even found Tesla? It’s true.

Errich

Errich is your old high school friend, whom you haven’t seen in 15 or 16 years and have been meaning to give a call ever since you moved to the town where you know he lives. You just hadn’t gotten around to it, what with all the hassles of starting a new job and dealing with selling one house and getting settled into a new one. You’d been meaning to get in touch, but apparently the SXSW gods decided you were way overdue because when you sauntered up to the line to take a Hail Mary shot at getting into the screening of Lucky, who’s standing right there in front of you? Yep, Errich. The guy looks great, and he tells you a little bit about he just recently quit his comfortable corporate gig of more than a decade to pursue a less stable career that fulfills his artistic passions. The leap he’s making gets you thinking about your own dreams and whether taking a big risk like Errich’s wouldn’t do you some good. Maybe it’s time you eschew the regularity of a steady paycheck for something a bit more adventurous. Have you accomplished yet what you’d like them to carve on your gravestone? Screw it, yeah, absolutely. Today is the first day of the rest of your life, and it’s about time you take this bull by the horns and run with it. “Bull by the horns”? Is that the right expression? And how would you run while holding onto bull horns? Oh, man, looks like Errich and you aren’t going to get into this movie. They just announced the theater is full. Maybe it’s a sign. Maybe now is the time to get started on your grand new ambitions in life. Right now, no delays. Oh, except there is that panel that sounds awesome and starts in about 10 minutes. If you book it, you can make it to the JW Marriott in time. Then there’s that band you wanted to hear afterward. And you’ll need to grab something to eat between sessions. Wait, where did Errich go?